


Mercy and a Minute

by rivlee



Series: Gone Are All The Days [4]
Category: Band of Brothers, The Pacific - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-07
Updated: 2012-02-07
Packaged: 2017-10-30 18:56:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,375
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/334986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rivlee/pseuds/rivlee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gene ain’t the man he once was. Part of the Modern!AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mercy and a Minute

**Author's Note:**

> **Disclaimer:** This is all fiction based off the characters as portrayed in the HBO mini-series. No disrespect is meant. Title from The Gaslight Anthem’s _1930_.
> 
>  **A/N:** Unbeated. First posted in September of 2011, written for Ray’s Time Stamp Meme prompt.

_**July 2004** _

Gene-Baptiste was changed. Merl-Francis couldn’t quite puzzle out the whatfors of it but the Gene-Baptiste before him wasn’t the same who left five months ago. Some of the changes were obvious, the dark and sunken eyes; the pale, chapped lips; the scrawny wrists hiding in a too big shirt. It wasn’t the physical changes that worried him, it was all that Gene-Baptiste left unsaid.

“You got something you want to say?” he asked. 

Gene-Baptiste shrugged and kept playing with his soda straw. All around them the people of Oceanside were chatting, enjoying the sunny day, but in their restaurant booth it was nothing but silence and blank stares.

Merl-Francis sighed and scratched the back of his head. He never did like the heavy silences like this, not with Gene-Baptiste. They only happened after someone died. When Grandma Roe went, Gene didn’t speak for three days. Merriell checked his watch and looked at the doorway. Burgie would be here soon and Gene’s manners would force him to utter something verbal. He breathed a heavy sigh of relief as Burgie passed by the hostess with a warm smile. Asshole was still in his uniform.

“You didn’t have to dress up to come to dinner,” Merriell said.

“If someone hadn’t borrowed my house key, I would’ve been able to change,” Burgie said. He sat down next to Merriell and nodded at Gene. “Doc, how are things?”

Gene’s lips twisted into the bitter mockery of a smile but he nodded. “Just fine, Sergeant.”

“Good,” Burgie said, “let’s get some dinner. Flo is supposed to be online tonight.”

“You’re so fucking pathetic,” Merriell said.

“Be nice to the man, Merl-Francis,” Gene said. 

Burgin looked between the two of them but didn’t say anything. He kept flipping through the menu and refused to make eye contact. The rat bastard traitor. 

“I got to make a call,” Gene said, leaving the booth.

“What the hell?” Burgin asked, once he was out of hearing distance.

Merriell shook his head. “Been like that since I got him from the airport.”

“What the _hell_ happened to him over there?”

“I don’t know, Burgie, I just know he cashed in favors from Speirs and Colbert to get him out.”

“Shit,” Burgie said. “Fuck.”

Merriell had to fight the urge to break something. Colbert and Speirs both worked international Black Ops, everyone who trained in Recon knew their names. These days they only get deployed on solo missions for some serious shit. Merriell didn’t know how the hell Gene got involved in all that, but it had to be tied to whatever the fucking government had him doing over there.

“We going get some nice dinner conversation tonight,” he said.

“Christ, Snaf, you could’ve warned me,” Burgie said, closing his menu with a snap.

“I had hoped he’d try to speak with you here.”

Burgie pinched his brow. “What the hell are you going to do?”

“Can’t force it with Gene-Baptiste. He’ll talk when he’s ready.”

“What are we supposed to do until then?”

Merriell shrugged. “Hope you like your food with an extra side of silence.”

“I do live with you,” Burgie said.

Merriell held up his middle finger in response.

 

************

Merriell never was good at sleeping. Couldn’t make it through a night without tossing and turning. His daddy always said it was the Cajun genes, making him ready to go at the sounds of flood, hurricane, or gator. Mama said he’d just always been that way. The only time he ever got a full night’s rest was during his first few weeks at Boot Camp. That wasn’t so much sleep as exhaustion, but he still liked to count it. 

Gene usually slept like the dead unless he was on duty. Merriell knew, from the years of sharing rooms and bed, when he was really sleeping and when he was just playing like. 

“You can stop faking,” Merriell said, moving to sit up against the headboard. “No playing opossum with me.”

Gene let out a long sigh before following suit.

Sharing a bed wasn’t a big deal to either of them. There was no harm of something else going on; such a relationship was never meant for the two of them. Their bond was far more powerful than any physical attraction. It was different, when you knew someone down to their very soul. Still, it was a comfort to have a warm body you knew like your own in the bed next to you. It just made it all that easier to tell when something was wrong.

“You need to sleep,” Gene said.

“I could say the same to you,” he said. He flicked one of Gene’s ears. “You going at least think up a lie to tell me why you so fucked up right now?”

“I don’t believe in the greater good,” Gene muttered.

“What’s that?”

“I couldn’t keep doing what they wanted me to do. Patriotism isn’t worth the loss of my soul.”

“What the hell are you talking about.”

Gene sputtered a laugh. “I wish I could tell you, Merriell, but then you’d throw down a horse’s head on someone’s desk.”

“It was a taxidermied hog’s head and I won it in a bet.”

Gene-Baptiste snorted in response but it was a genuine reaction. Much better than the distance and the dead eyes.

Merriell batted his eyelashes at him. “What if I promise to be well behaved.”

He shook his head. “You be capable of many things, but that ain’t one of them.”

“That’s a lie,” Merriell said. 

“It ain’t. Burgie sends me progress reports.”

“Then where the hell are my gold stars?”

“We’re waiting for the day when you complete a load of laundry without ruining something.”

Merriell wanted to argue that, but knew he couldn’t. He’d never gotten along with washing machines. 

“You going even try and tell me what happened.”

“I can’t,” Gene insisted.

“Yeah you can.”

“No, I _can’t_. It’s the type of thing where the less people know the safer they all are.”

Merriell poked him in the side, laughing when Gene batted his hand away. “Give me a clue,” he said. 

Gene looked down at his hands, dropping eye contact for his confession. “Some people will do anything to win a war. I went over there to help, Merl-Francis, and I’m going to have to live with all the harm I done did.”

“Merde,” Merriell said. He poked Gene in the side until he raised his head. He was greeted with a scowl. “What you going to do now?”

“Besides murder you in your sleep?”

“ _First do no harm_ ,” Merriell quoted. 

Gene punched him in the thigh. “You’re an asshole.”

“Yeah, and?”

Gene wrapped his arms around his knees. “I’m going back to the clinic.”

“Thought you wanted to be a big city doctor. Go up North and work among the cultured folk.”

“Plenty of doctors in the city. Ain’t that many in our parish. Got to start helping somewhere.”

“Our people don’t need your pity, Gene-Baptiste.”

“They getting my dedication,” Gene said. He looked at Merriell. “I ain’t going back broken. My hands may shake now and then, I might not be able to sleep, but I’m going home with a purpose.”

“And when did you decide that?”

“Sometime between dinner and bed.”

Merriell shrugged. He couldn’t fault that logic. He’d made greater decisions in less time.

“I just wanted to see you before you ship out again. I was here anyway,” Gene said, his eyes gone watery.

“We got a few more months. Gotta train all the boot drops.”

“Anyone interesting?” Gene asked. 

“Some kid from Alabama. Don’t think he’ll hack it.”

Gene gave him a look reminiscent of Grandma Roe.

“What?”

“I’m sure as much was said about you. Don’t doubt him.”

“He should be in school.”

“Well he ain’t,” Gene said, “he’s made it this far and you will not antagonize him, Merl-Francis.”

Merriell rolled his eyes.

“Don’t roll your eyes at me boy, I will get out of this bed and kick your ass.”

Merriell slung an arm around Gene’s shoulder and pulled him into a hug.

“Good to have you back,” he murmured into Gene’s hair.

Gene-Baptiste said nothing, just let his tears fall. Merl-Francis just pulled him closer.


End file.
